Teach Cosmic Appreciation!
Q. Dear Bracha, how do I help my kids to learn to appreciate what they have? At what age are they capable of grasping such concepts?
A. What a wonderful question you have asked and one with tremendous ramifications on how your child will feel and make others feel. When we appreciate things we feel good. When we let others know that we appreciate what has been done for us, we make them feel good too. This is one of those win-win situations that has value beyond our own personal well-being, a truly positive ripple effect ensues, so the question is vitally important and very trick to answer.
The real point of the matter is that we learn what we live and nowhere is that more evident than in the way we view life. There are a few tricks to passing on this characteristic, the main one being it has to be observable. In other words if you have a positive attitude and are grateful for things, wonderful, but how are your children going to pick up on this unless you are able to articulate it or use it in some observable way? Therein lies the difficulty…how do you show appreciation?
Most people show appreciation by saying thank you, but this is a very shallow view of an enriching concept and not the way we can internalize a real feeling of being grateful. While we’re on the subject I would like to say that being truly grateful for what one has leads to a satisfying life. We have all heard of the sayin; “Who is happy? He who is satisfied with his lot.” and it is so true. Though being satisfied is somewhat different than being grateful, ultimately both refer to appreciation. Because a discussion of all these concepts could be quite prolonged, for the rest of this column I will stick to the original question of appreciation.
There are several types of appreciation; the personal, the interpersonal and the cosmic.
Personal appreciation: Appreciation what you have, this includes your abilities and your belongings
Interpersonal: Appreciating those around you for who and what they are such as family, friends, teachers and even the kind stranger who helps you or even smiles at you. Appreciate them for their good qualities – this assigns value to it (ipso facto) - as well as appreciating whatever these individuals do for you.
Cosmic appreciation: Appreciation of the beauty of the world and everything in it. To really experiencing the exquisiteness of a blade of grass or the artistic wonder in an outcropping of rock.
So the first thing I would ask you is how often are you telling your children how much you appreciate these things, not in a general sense but as they happen, immediately, specifically and in such a concrete way that they will be able to see it for themselves? Whether it’s in word, deed or being drawn in to appreciate the moment with you, you are the vehicle by which your children first see the world. Talk to your children; let them know how you feel about things especially how their actions and the actions of others made you feel happy. Someone did a good thing to you and the first way to appreciate it is to actually “see” it. Acknowledging this “happening” sensitizes ourselves to be aware of these gestures of kindness and consideration and is a huge first step in appreciation.
As you create this dialog with your children around the positive aspects of your day, the things you noted and/or the kind acts of others (towards you or someone else – or you for someone else) slowly starts to encourage your children to tell you about their day. You will find that they quickly get used to making observations of their own and can get drawn into acknowledging these acts of kindness very easily.
Comment on acts of kindness as they occur (Did you see that woman help that elderly man. Wasn’t she wonderful! I wish I had been able to move so fast.) or on observations (Have you ever seen such a beautiful sunset, and right in our own back yard! Let’s sit here for just a minute and appreciate these fantastic colors.) This is the most effective way to help children develop the characteristic of appreciation as children need to see and do things in concrete form. Therefore commenting on something they are actually able to see has more effect than something that is simply described, even though the second method is still worthwhile. As to your remaining question; you can never be too young to start. Each child will learn what they are capable of at each age and constantly build on that. As far as learning the art of appreciation is concerned, “The earlier the better, the more lessons the merrier!”
As you explore this dialogue of appreciation with your children I hope you will find that you have affected your own life as well. By heightening your own sense of appreciation I hope you and those around you will come to know how blessed you truly are. Wishing you and your family all the best! - Bracha
